It is officially midsummer and I need to talk about my nemesis; the tomato My tomatoes to be specific.
…..I love tomatoes. Childhood memories abound about fresh tomatoes. Taking one fresh out of the garden and eating it like an apple. Tomato sandwiches with just mayonnaise, a hefty tomato slice, salt and pepper and Wonder Bread. As I got older, I learned about a Caprese salad, with tomato, buffalo mozzarella, fresh basil and olive oil. I just can’t wait for tomato season and since I live in the country there’s no good reason I shouldn’t grow my own.
…….Anybody can grow tomatoes. And, you don’t have to have a great big farm. A friend of mine does container tomatoes on her patio. I try, but I always fail.. Repeated attempts to grow tomatoes end in heartbreak. I water it too much. I don’t water it enough. The plant either withers and dies or the tomatoes end up mishappen and half decayed. Mother Nature it seems, is mocking me.
…….It is ME, dear reader. I may live in the Country but I am not a country girl. When my daughter, Shannon, lived in this house, she had tomato plants beside the garage and they grew like crazy. She would share with me how she made a dinner with pasta, fresh tomato, tuna, olve oil and fresh basil. Brother-in-law Bill Webster had a garden in his small yard in New Cumberland. There were so many tomatoes he would pick them and put them on a picnic table and if you visited my sister would hand you a small paper sack and tell you to take some home. The little lunch sack could never hold more than 3 tomatoes. I never had the audacity to ask for a bigger sack, but I always wanted to.
…..So this year I bought a big and healthy tomato plant from Ianettis. I watered it….I watched it…..and I thought I was on the right track when it got little flowers.
……Imagine my glee when I awoke to find a beautiful green tomato. I watched with pride as it turned red and when it did I prepared to pick it. As I turned it around to marvel that I had finally raised a tomato, the other side was disfigured..rotten…and mocking me. Nope my tomatoes had the blight.
……I wasn’t going to give up. I went back to Ianetti’s and got spray and soil stuff and returned home to wage war.
……Raising a tomato shouldn’t be so hard, but for those of us without a green thumb it is painful and darned near impossible.
…….For others? Shannon now calls Uncle Bill’s and Aunt Marsha’s house her own and with that the super garden that she deems magic because of super soil mix Uncle Bill prepared stuff just grows.. Not having done much with her garden, she reported to me everything she was growing in that super fertile soil. Yes, her tomatoes are fine and as she hears my heartbreaking tomato story, she tells me she will share her tomatoes with me.
……..This time I’m bringing a large sack in which to take them home.
